The Business of Art Museums

I don't know doodly-squat about business and running a museum but two stories recently came to my attention about museum buildings that really highlight the difficulties of preserving cultural patrimony in this age of tough economics.

In Cologne, Germany, there was a thriving and quite large Jewish community.  The community even weathered Crusader massacres in 1096 and Plague retaliation in 1349, and limped along until the advent of the Nazis.  A rich trove of many different artifacts has been uncovered and lies unacknowledged and unused in storage.  There's a dig in the city, where a new museum was proposed in 2007, but the general feeling is that Cologne is too broke to build a museum and that there's a sufficiently big Jewish museum in Berlin (250 miles away).  The museum is proposed at $64 million ($50+million euros); building a modern facility is undoubtedly expensive.  No denying that there are other places to spend that money.  Are there better causes?  Depends on your values, doesn't it?  It's a tough question as the AP story highlights--there's a solid number of people signing a petition against it.  But it seems to me that the placing of a fake bomb/suitcase and the carving of swastikas are also an indication that those who do not know the past are condemned to making ignorant and hateful statements until history smacks them upside the head.  If it were me on the committee, I'd seriously look into scaling back plans, seeing if we could find a locale to overhaul or build smaller/differently to get some of the collection into public exposure.  There might be a balance that could be achieved in this difficult economic climate that doesn't mean all or nothing for both history and services.

Here in the US, MoMA has bought the locale next door, the former American Folk Art Museum at 45 W. 53rd St. (link to NY Times article, pay wall may apply).  The museum building was a big deal--designed by talented and ambitious architects (Tod Williams and Billie Tsien) and opened after the 9/11 attacks.  But it was doomed--the museum borrowed $32 million for the expansion to this site.  I've not been to the new site, though know folks who have and have said lovely things about the American Folk Museum.  We can look back now to the bubbles that burst in construction, NYC, non-profits, tourist trade; we can be pleased that MoMA has the ability/resources to make use of the site.  We can also wonder why MoMA will raze the building and rebuild in its own signature metal and glass; is branding so important that the satellite extension needs to look like the rest of the buildingS?  Would there be a better use of the money?  Again, depends on your values.  I have to feel like there could be museum uses that respected the architecture of the building (especially since it meets museum needs; this doesn't need to be a major new use renovation).  I have to feel that there could be ways to spend less money but the pockets of MoMA are very deep.  Director Glenn Lowry suggests that they could put in another restaurant and shop on the ground floor--because maybe that is our cultural patrimony: look at the art and then buy a cheap reproduction on a coffee mug to take home.

Added 4/11, after the initial post: Hrag Vartanian over at Hyperallergic  also reflects on the MoMA purchase, with less flattering things to say about the Folk Art building in general but raising the question of buildings themselves as part of our cultural heritage.